writer applauds our industry, and thinks "there must be considerable truth" in the remarks we ventured to make in last week's Gazette, touching the many deplorable events of the last few weeks.
The Wreck of the Royal Charter
On pages 90 to 92 of the present volume is described the extraordinarily sudden and severe changes of weather which locally preceded the violent gale of the 24th and 25th of October, 1859. In connection with the latter destructive visitation in particular and the foregoing list of phenomenal disasters in general, the lamentable wreck of the Royal Charter is worthy of a permanent record, reminding one, as it did the similar misfortune which befell the Brazen sloop of war on the rocks at Newhaven in 1800, and the Association ship of war on the Rocks of Scully, in 1707, when the brave Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell and his crew were lost. One of the fine old English songs, appealing to landsmen, says -
Ye Gentlemen of England
Who live at home at ease,
How little do you think upon
The dangers of the seas"
But when the equinoctial or other devastating gales set in stolid must be he or she who never spares a thought for out tempest-tossed brethren on the foaming billows. Never, perhaps in the history of contemporary events had there been a more saddening incident than the wreck of the Royal Charter. This gallant vessel had steamed home in triumph; had made one of the quickest passages on record; had successfully battled with the stormy waves when there was but "sky above and the sea below" and had actually arrived home when lo! in the very hour of triumph, destruction came upon the ill-fated vessel, and Death, with a grim smile, seized in his ivy grasp nearly 500 beings at one tell swoop.
Then rose from sea to sea the wild farewell
We cannot (remarked the St. Leonards Gazette at the time), recording a passing word of sorrow for the fate of so many fellow creatures hurled into eternity with only a few minutes warning. How terrible must have been the agony when the ship struck! How more terrible still that awful moment when the gallant vessel was torn asunder by the power of the waves! Oh, the agony of that crisis! - the merciless waves dashing over the breaking vessel and the helpless beings cast out by the -
